Tag Archives: hamilton

Evening, Upper Hamilton Lake and Kaweah Gap

Evening, Upper Hamilton Lake and Kaweah Gap
Evening, Upper Hamilton Lake and Kaweah Gap. Sequoia National Park, California. August 6, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Color photograph of Upper Hamilton Lake and Kaweah Gap as evening sun strikes peaks around the upper basin – Sequoia National Park, California.

Upper Hamilton Lake is located on the High Sierra Trail in Sequoia National Park, and is the traditional camping spot before climbing over Kaweah Gap on the ridge in this photograph. I arrived there on August 6, 2008 on the second day of nine-day trans-Sierra backpacking trip from Crescent Meadow to Whitney portal, and we left the next morning to climb the Gap and head to points east.

This photograph was made in the evening as the sun set, sending its light through the narrow opening of the canyon to the west toward the wall at the upper end of the lake – while the high ridge is still in sunlight the lake and surrounding slopes are already in shadow. The photograph was made from a position not more than ten or twelve feet from my campsite.

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Combining Exposures in Wide Dynamic Range Scenes

My apologies, but as a result of a move to a new hosting company this article is no longer available. I’m hopeful that I’ll be able to recreate it or a replacement eventually.

Ascending to Kaweah Gap

Ascending to Kaweah Gap
Ascending to Kaweah Gap

Ascending to Kaweah Gap. Sequoia National Park. August 6, 2008. © Copyright 2008 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

My friend Caroline ascends the High Sierra Trail toward Kaweah Gap above Upper Hamilton Lake in Sequoia National Park, California on the morning of the third day of a 9-day trans-Sierra pack trip from Crescent Meadow to Whitney Portal.

The High Sierra Trail crosses the entire range between Crescent Meadow in the west and Whitney Portal in the east, and travels through Sequoia National Park with the exception of the section to the east of Whitney Trail Crest. This portion above Upper Hamilton Lake ascends about 2500′ rather steeply to Kaweah Gap, a beautiful pass over the Great Western Divide by which the trail reaches Big Arroyo and the Kern River drainage.

In this photo Caroline has finished most of the very steep initial ascent above Hamilton Lake and is crossing an area of many streams and meadows and flowers shortly before arriving at Precipice Lake, from which it is only a short distance to the Gap.


G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.